Tallahassee Community College Library in Tallahassee Florida
is a multifaceted resource serving our students, faculty and our community,
on campus and online !

Thursday, February 28, 2013

American Black Journal

American Black Journal.  A public interest television program produced by Detroit Public Television and filmed in Detroit, American Black Journal (ABJ) first aired in 1968 under the name Colored People Time.
This was a time of profound political and social tumult in African American communities, and Detroit was smarting from pervasive racial tensions. The mission of ABJ was "to increase the availability and accessibility of media relating to African American experiences in order to encourage greater involvement from Detroit citizens in working to resolve community problems." Now, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Detroit Public Television and Michigan State University have digitized 36 years of ABJ shows, creating an invaluable archive of African American history.
True to its mission, ABJ highlighted political, racial, economic, and social issues in Detroit. It included not just the voices of the leaders but also the voices of the followers at the neighborhood level who were ignored by mainstream media. The show's first-person approach brought immediacy to the frustrations and celebrations of Detroit's black population. ABJ also represented the black viewpoint beyond Detroit, thus connecting Detroit's issues with those of the rest of black America. The list of guests who appeared on the program is impressive: Louis Farrakhan, Berry Gordy, Cornel West, Desmond Tutu, Isaiah Thomas, Ossie Davis, James Brown, Alex Haley, Bobby Seale, and dozens of others.
Searching ABJ is intuitive. In addition to a basic keyword search, the site allows browsing the programs by guest, host, or theme and browsing episodes chronologically by decade. Each episode is tagged with guests, host, and themes, and hyperlinked to related episodes. The full-length episodes load quickly. The quality of the video and sound is exceptional. ABJ is an important archive for scholars of African American history. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All users. -- R. Walsh, Trinity College. Outstanding Title!  Reviewed in ACRL's March 2011 Choice.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

Although its URL points specifically to the Oscars, this site is the official domain of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), of which the Oscars is only one (albeit significant) part. The site is divided into six major sections, reflecting the organization's scope: The Awards, Meet the Academy, Events and Exhibitions, Science and Technology, Education and Outreach, and Research and Preservation. The Awards section gives a year-by-year history of the ceremonies, with a searchable separate database for detailed information, along with some photos, nonfilmic historical events of each year, rules, and eligibility. Meet the Academy offers some information on members and existing buildings, and notes a few purchasable books/posters. Events and Exhibitions posts information on AMPAS-hosted exhibitions, and Science and Technology briefly examines technical issues. Education and Outreach is relatively sparse, with some information on AMPAS programs.
Research and Preservation has such hidden gems as the Academy Awards Acceptance Speech Database (with some only in transcript format), the Motion Picture Scripts Database (scripts held by Los Angeles area libraries), the Motion Picture Credits Database, and the catalogs of the Margaret Herrick Library for film studies. A simple search box provides access to the entire site, including the Oscar listings. In general the site is user-friendly and fast. . . . .  for general information on AMPAS, users will find this resource sufficient. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-level undergraduates and general audience. -- A. J. Adam, Blinn College Reviewed November 2011, ACRL's CHOICE.

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

Army Heritage Collections Online

U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center (USAHEC). 
The U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center (USAHEC) is the United States Army's preeminent museum and research complex. We are dedicated to educating and preserving the legacy of the men and women who have served their nation as Soldiers.

Mission: The USAHEC team makes historical materials available for use to support the U.S. Army, educate an international audience, and honor Soldiers - past and present.
Intent: Our intent is to establish the U.S. Army Heritage and Education Center as the nation's preeminent military research and education complex, dedicated to the study of the United States Army. In order to achieve this goal, the team must adapt. We will transform the organization, creating a digital archive, multi-discipline processing team, and historical services team. Additionally, we will combine customer support and education activities, as well as move collection management activities to the staff.

The Digital Documents section of this site provides access to materials drawn from the archival collections of the United States Army Military History Institute. The available materials range from over 6,000 Civil War photographs to transcripts of interviews from the Senior Officer Oral History Program.
Users may browse the materials by collection name, specific time period, or by type of material (photographs, military publications, audio/visual items, oral history material, and finding aids to the institute's holdings). The effective searching mechanism provides searching by creator/author, collection, series, historical time period, title, keywords, and full text.  Within full-text searching, the entered terms can be searched as Boolean (which requires an exact match), Pattern (which does not require an exact match), or Concept (which uses thesauri). Reviewed in ACRL's May 2011 issue of CHOICE.

Thursday, February 21, 2013

The FOOD Museum Online

The FOOD Museum Online:   is a nonprofit educational organization "committed to connecting people of all ages with the essential subject of food," and identifying and preserving "sites and artifacts associated with our rapidly disappearing local and global food heritage." To achieve their mission, the FOOD Museum staff post entertaining links and colorful online exhibits related to food, agriculture, and culinary heritage. Videos, online exhibits, and links to relevant Web sites are provided by professors in various disciplines, history museums, school districts, and academic institutions. The Issues section features brief articles on such important topics as obesity, hunger, and school lunches. Food Heritage  recalls the connection of food with our cultural history and identity. Links under Food Exhibits are international.  Summing Up: Recommended. General readers and primary and secondary school teachers and their students. -- R. S. Wexelbaum, Saint Cloud State University Reviewed in ACRL's July 2011  CHOICE.

Thursday, February 14, 2013

Environment News Service.

 Established in 1990, the privately owned Environment News Service (ENS) focuses on presenting "late-breaking" national and international environmental issues and news "in a fair and balanced manner." The articles are appropriate to its name and mission. With newspaper-style writing and presentation, these are not technical documents, but short, informative articles from the US and around the world.
The site is updated daily and covers a wide array of current environmental issues ranging from solar power, deforestation, and food production to environmental disasters such as flooding and typhoons. Article topics, though not unique, provide another voice on issues.
The home page is well organized. Primary articles include pictures with title links and an introductory paragraph. The pages load quickly with the primary information being the focal point of the page. The menu buttons across the top of the page and the right menu bar provide access to additional information.
The About section introduces the reader to the ENS mission and general contributor information.  Subscribe allows users to register for e-mail updates; an RSS feed button is also available on the main page. Search the monthly archive of articles dating back to 2002. Searching is Google-style, retrieving articles posted by ENS. The Contact section lists editors, telephone numbers, and e-mail addresses, as well as a US toll-free telephone number and ENS representatives listed by US region or country.
Overall, the articles in ENS
could be useful to those who teach environmental classes and for those highly interested in environmental issues. Summing Up: Recommended. All levels/libraries. -- R. L. Thompson, Missouri State University   Reviewed in ACRL's March 2011 CHOICE.

Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Africa Portal

Africa Portal, from the Centre for International Governance Innovation, Makerere Univ., and South African Inst. of International Affairs.  An "online knowledge resource for policy-related issues on Africa," is a project of the Africa Initiative, a "multi-year, donor-supported program, with three components: a research program, an exchange program, and an online portal."
Its Africa Initiative Research section focus is on critical areas of African policy: Conflict Resolution, Energy, Food Security, Health, Migration, and Climate Change. The Library is a collection of over 5,000 books, journals, and digital documents and is completely open access; all material is available as full-text downloads. A Library search for "food security" yielded a list of results accompanied by several options for refining results (by year, subject, topic  or country). Each item in the results list is assigned at least one subject term; these are Library of Congress Subject Headings (and are clickable to bring back all items that also have that heading).

The Opinion/Analysis section  features "informed commentary, analysis, and backgrounders on current events related to African policy issues," particularly in the six critical areas mentioned above.
The Experts tab reveals a directory of prominent scholars/practitioners and includes brief biographies, contact information, and in some cases, photos.
Finally, the Events section lists meetings, conferences, lectures, and other events on African policy issues; it currently includes events through the end of 2011.
Each event is tagged for the appropriate critical area. Summing Up: Recommended. Lower-level undergraduates through professionals / practitioners interested in African policy issues. -- E. A. Francis, Oberlin College Library. Reviewed in ACRL's May 2011 CHOICE

Wednesday, February 06, 2013

The Art of Ancient Greek Theater

The Art of Ancient Greek Theater. By happy coincidence, this site appeared just as this reviewer was concluding a section on Greek theater for a Theater History I course and thus could ask students to "test drive" the site in terms of its usefulness for the class. Developed as part of an exhibit that ran from August 2010 to early January 2011, the site includes three different, vitally important features: an images section (picturing the exhibited items), an interactive map, and a papyrus fragment (pictured and spoken).
All these combine to afford an appreciation for the golden age of Greek theater. The images section provides examples of vase paintings and sculpture that relate to either the plays presented in Greek theaters or production practices. This art represents, among other things, several surviving Greek tragedies: Aeschylus's The Libation Bearers, Sophocles' Oedipus, and Euripedes' Medea. One of this section's particular strengths is audio commentary on scenes represented on the artifacts. The interactive map shows the location of Greek theaters throughout the Mediterranean area. Many of the locations offer a picture of the remains of the theater (and directions to the site), and these serve the useful purpose of demonstrating the evolution of Greek theatrical architecture. The papyrus section features a fragment from Sophocles' satyr play, The Trackers. One can zoom in on the papyrus itself, and an audio recording in ancient Greek (as well as English) provides the rare opportunity to hear ancient Greek spoken. Well organized, quick, efficient, and easy to navigate, this impressive site provides visitors with an excellent way to enhance study of Greek theater and to marvel at the artwork connected to ancient Greek theater. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All users. -- M. D. Whitlatch, Buena Vista University Reviewed in ACRL's February 2011 CHOICE.